Public Bill Committee

[Mr. Christopher Chope in the Chair]

Written evidence to be reported to the House

LPGI 10 Health Link
LGPI 11 Mayor of London
LGPI 12 Calderdale PPIH Forum

Clause 31

Eligible councils

Amendment proposed [8 February]: No. 94, in clause 31, page 17, line 37, after ‘to’, insert ‘(a)’.—[Andrew Stunell.]

Question again proposed, That the amendment be made.

Christopher Chope: I remind the Committee that with this we are taking the following: Amendment No. 95, in clause 31, page 17, line 38, at end insert—
‘(b) a scheme for whole council elections’.
Amendment No. 96, in clause 31, page 18, line 2, at end insert—
‘(2A) A council is subject to a scheme for whole elections if, under the scheme for the ordinary elections of its councillors, all of the councillors are elected in each year in which the elections are held.’.
Amendment No. 111, in clause 32, page 18, line 7, at end insert ‘or partial-council elections’.
Amendment No. 112, in clause 32, page 18, line 8, after ‘partial-council’, insert ‘or whole-council’.
Amendment No. 113, in clause 32, page 18, line 9, after ‘whole-council’, insert ‘or partial-council’.
Amendment No. 114, in clause 32, page 18, line 11, after ‘whole-council’, insert ‘or partial-council’.
Amendment No. 98, in clause 32, page 18, line 13, at end insert
‘within eight years of a resolution being made in accordance with subsection (1).’.
New clause 6—Changing scheme for ordinary whole council elections—
‘(1) This section applies if an eligible council resolves, during a permitted resolution period, that the council is to be subject to the scheme for partial-council elections.
(2) The council ceases to be subject to the scheme for whole council elections.
(3) The council becomes subject to the scheme for partial-council elections.
(4) The council must not pass the resolution unless it has taken reasonable steps to consult on the change to partial-council elections.
(5) It is for the council to decide which persons it is appropriate to consult.
(6) No resolution of the council may reverse the effect of this section within eight years of a resolution being made in accordance with subsection (1).
(7) In this section “permitted resolution period”, in relation to an eligible council, means a period specified in the second column of the following table in relation to that type of council

Type of eligible council

Permitted resolution periods
Metropolitan district
(1) The period ending 31st December 2007 (2) The period in 2011, or in any fourth year afterwards, which—
(a) starts with 1st October, and (b) ends with 31st December.
Non-metropolitan district
 (1) The period ending with 31st December 2010. (2) The period in 2014, or in any fourth year afterwards, which—
(a) starts with 1st October, and (b) ends with 31st December.
(8) The Secretary of State may by order provide that a permitted resolution period is to end later than the last day of that period specified in the table.’.
New clause 7—Scheme for partial-council elections— 
‘(1) The scheme for partial-council elections is as follows.
(2) The term of office of councillors is four years.
(3) Elections of the councillors of the council are to be held in the year after the resolution is passed and every year after it other than every third year after it.
(4) One third (or as nearly as may be) of the councillors are elected in each year in which the elections are held.
(5) On the fourth day after elections are held—
(a) the councillors elected in those elections are to come into office, and
(b) the sitting councillors are to retire.
(6) In this section—
“resolution period” means the permitted resolution period in which the council passes a resolution for the purposes of section 32;
“sitting councillors” means the councillors who hold office at the time ordinary elections are held.’.

Andrew Gwynne: First, Mr. Chope, I welcome you and everyone else back to the Committee. Before I was rudely interrupted by the short recess—I trust that yours was good—I was making a strong defence of the election by thirds system. I wish to place on record my thanks to those who produce the Official Report of the Committee’s proceedings. I recalled that at the end of the previous sitting I was stopped mid-sentence and, after many sleepless nights trying to remember where I was in mid-sentence, I read with pleasure that my statement finished with a full stop. I am happy for that to remain so.
Unlike in Tameside, where there has been a long period of Labour control, and even in neighbouring Stockport, where, although the council currently has a Liberal Democrat majority, it is more the norm for no party to be in control, the system of thirds allows the officers to plan ahead. If it looks as though the parties in control are likely to change at an election, they can open up discussions with the opposition party or parties that are likely to take control after the election to talk about manifesto commitments, priorities and budgetary issues. It is clearly a system that is tried and tested, and one that works.
I acknowledge that, because most of my local political experience has been of annual elections by thirds, I am biased. I understand that councillors and Members of Parliament from areas that use an all-out system often hold similarly strong views about that system in the opposite direction from mine. That is the real issue, because there is no wrong or right way in which to elect councillors. Thirds is right for my area; others believe that all-out elections are right for their area. When people believe that the system is wrong for their area, why should they not be able to put their case and, after careful consideration and a council resolution, change it? That is what this part of the Bill will do and why I support it.
However, why must it be a one-way process? If it is okay for councils to move away from elections by thirds to all-out elections, why can they not move the other way? If a metropolitan borough, such as Stockport or Tameside, can move to all-out elections, why should not a London borough move from all-out elections to elections by thirds if it wants to? That it cannot is the source of my objection to the provision. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan that if, after an acceptable period such as eight or 12 years, perhaps more, the new system has failed to bed down, why should a council after careful consideration and a further resolution not be able to go back to the previous system? The would be real devolution and real letting go, which is what I hope we achieve through the Bill. I hope that the Minister will respond positively to my suggestions.
Given that, I urge the hon. Member for Hazel Grove, a fellow Stockport MP, to withdraw his amendments so that we can return later to the issue, with renewed vigour if necessary.

Tom Levitt: I rise to continue the Back-Bench rebellion that has been swirling for more than 12 days and almost 15 minutes. I have 10 years’ experience in local government at all three levels: four years as a parish councillors, two as a district councillor and four as a county councillor. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish, I have experience of both election by thirds and all-out elections.
I would not advocate that a county council move to thirds because it would mean large multi-member constituencies and, in any case, county wards are so big that they do not equate to community boundaries; they are bigger. However, at district level, I have had experience of both systems and I favour elections by thirds. In Stroud district council, of which I was a member for two years, that does not necessarily mean that each ward has to be a three-member ward. It just means that a third of the councillors, including one in each three-member ward or none in the single or double member wards is elected each year.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish said, voting by thirds means that there will be no catastrophic change, leading to long-term planning not being possible. It means that there is constant public scrutiny and annual accountability. When there is a problem with a hung council, which is not always a problem, it can be resolved by the electorate within 12 months. Voting by thirds means that the parties have to find fewer candidates and that fighting elections costs less, although over the cycle the costs would be considerably greater. Although the turnout in any particular year can be shown to be smaller for elections by thirds than all-out elections, the turnout over the four-year cycle is considerably greater. Many people take the opportunity to vote more than once in the four-year period, and many more people have the opportunity to cast a vote.
I am not arguing that thirds is always the answer or that it should be the aspiration, but as others have said, it should be an option. Councils have the option to choose one method or the other and to change from one to the other, but very few councils take that opportunity. Therefore, to make it implicit in the Bill that a change in one direction is favoured over a change in the other—that one direction is right and the other is wrong—is almost to address a problem that does not exist. In any case, it does not address the question of a local council having the ability to decide. The unfortunate impression given by clause 31 is that it will make the process a one-way street. I therefore hope that the Minister will remove it. A former Secretary of State with responsibility for local government, Nicholas Ridley, who was for a time my Member of Parliament, described one-way streets as an infringement of civil rights. He may have chosen the wrong target for that comment—he was Transport Secretary at the time, I believe. However, in the Bill, a one-way street should not be the only way for councils to go when considering their electoral arrangements.
The downside of elections by thirds is that they are more expensive for councils to run. They eat up the time of officers because of the need to have elections in three years out of every four. It means that councillors need to have one eye on the electorate the whole time, not only during elections. Council tax has to be set bearing in mind electoral consequences every year, not once every four years. There are many reasons why councils should avoid voting by thirds, but they are not particularly good reasons. Paradoxically, the effect of passing the Bill as it stands could be that fewer councils will move to all-out elections, because they will not want to take the irrevocable step of moving in that direction. I do not think that there should be an implicit bias one way or the other; there should be a choice.
Finally, all-out election clearly fits the model of an elected mayor rather better than election by thirds. However, the tail should not be wagging the dog. We need to look at a wider range of models of executive accountability, a matter that we will come to later. As my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish said, some members of the committee form a little cluster: Denton and Reddish, Hazel Grove, and High Peak. I hope that the fourth member of the cluster, our neighbour the Minister, will join us. However, I hope that the hon. Member for Hazel Grove will withdraw his amendment and allow the Government time to take into account the view of both the Committee and of those who participated in the previous scrutiny process. 
Sir Peter Soulsby (Leicester, South) (Lab) rose—
Patrick Hall (Bedford) (Lab) rose—

Christopher Chope: I call Sir Patrick Hall—sorry, Sir Peter Soulsby.

Peter Soulsby: There is clearly considerable enthusiasm on the Labour Back Benches for amendments Nos. 94 and 95. Like other hon. Members, I am sympathetic to the Government’s desire to see effective and stable leadership in local government. That wish, which is clearly reflected in the Bill, is to ensure that local councils engage with their communities and electorates. If there were overwhelming evidence that effective leadership and engagement with local communities could be significantly enhanced by holding whole-council elections, I would support such elections and welcome a move by the Government to ensure that they were universal. However, there is no evidence that that leadership and that engagement are achieved by the mechanism of whole-council elections; therefore the Government are not proposing that that system should be universal.
Like a number of other hon. Members, I have served on councils that have had whole-council elections and on those that have had elections by thirds, and the experience is very mixed. In some circumstances, election by thirds produces effective leadership and engagement with local communities. In other circumstances, whole-council elections produce the same results. Sometimes, the reverse applies: I have seen areas that use elections by thirds in which councils have been out of touch with the electorate and community, and areas that use whole-council elections in which local communities have had little engagement with their local councils.
I can understand why, in many areas, local party activists prefer whole-council elections. I have heard it argued quite powerfully in a council that is not unknown to me and in which, against my judgment and my wishes, a choice was made of election for the whole council. There is no evidence that that accomplished anything other than a quiet life for party activists for a couple of years, or that it in any way enhanced the quality of the council’s leadership or the engagement of local people with that council.

Andrew Stunell: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would want to substitute the words party inactivists for party activists.

Peter Soulsby: I suspect that we all have party inactivists as well as activists, and sometimes all parties feel that the inactivists are in the majority.
Very briefly, my argument, like that of other Back-Bench Members, is that if it is possible to move only in one direction—from elections by thirds to whole-council elections—I suspect that, perversely, it will make councils less likely to want to experiment. Knowing that there is no way back will make them reluctant to move towards whole-council elections rather than willing to grasp the idea on an experimental basis.
It is important to ensure that councils that choose to make such a change are not able to do so at short intervals, or in ways that are difficult for a local electorate to understand or that are confusing for the administration of the authority. It is important, of course, to prevent rapid reversals of direction, but it is also important to allow reversals of direction.
My firm view is that it is not the pattern of elections that is the determining factor in either public engagement or in effective leadership. There are different circumstances in different local authorities. For that reason, I hope that it will not be necessary to press the amendment to a vote and that the Government will listen and agree with the overwhelming view that is being expressed from both sides of the Committee that the matter is one for local discretion taking local circumstances into consideration, and that it should be left to the local councils involved.

Bob Neill: I had not intended to intervene in the discussion, but there has not been such an uprising in the midlands since the pilgrimage of grace and as a southerner I could not resist the temptation to encourage it a little and see whether Labour Members would march to the gates of London and what response they would get from Ministers. I believe that on the previous occasion the gates were locked against the pilgrims. I hope that they will not be on this occasion, because the points that have been made are valid.
My experience, like yours, Mr. Chope, is as a member of a London borough council. I spent 16 years in a system of all-out elections every four years. On the other hand, my wife has served as a member of a unitary council elected by thirds. Working out who should canvass for whom, where and at what time has been a matter of domestic interest to us. She has not persuaded me any more than I have persuaded her. I remain of the view that there is considerable merit in the four-year cycle that we have in the London boroughs, ironically because it permits long-term planning and enables a new administration to know that it has a four-year run and officers to know where they stand. A few years ago, when my party lost control of the London borough of Bexley by one seat despite getting a majority of the popular vote, I was briefly almost converted to elections by thirds, but as we gained 23 seats last May, all was put right in the end.
The key test is this: if we are serious about devolution, the decision ought to be for a local authority to take. I take the point that that is true whether an authority is a London borough or a district. The hon. Member for High Peak made a valid point about the linkage with mayoral systems. In the London boroughs we have a certain number of directly elected mayors and it is clearly much easier in those circumstances to have all-out elections coinciding with mayoral elections. I certainly do not advocate electing the London assembly by thirds, although it might be an interesting idea. It should surely be a matter for a local authority to determine.
I was interested in the discussion about the effect of using thirds instead of all-out elections on turnout and engagement. I am inclined to agree that, by and large, that is not the determining factor. My hon. Friends and I will argue that other parts of the Bill miss opportunities to take measures that would enhance turnout, but the real disincentive to people to turn out to vote in elections is frequently the thought that it will not make any difference because local authorities themselves have very little discretionary power to make a difference. Enhancing local authorities’ freedom of action would undoubtedly be the greatest means of incentivising people to turn out to vote, and we have not gone as far as we would like in that respect. However, the electoral cycle is not the main determinant of turnout.
I have sympathy with the Labour Members who have spoken on the point that the clause is a classic one-way street. That cannot be right and I cannot see any intellectual justification for it. If it is right to move in one direction and if we believe that local authorities should as far as possible have the power to determine their own administrative arrangements, then surely to goodness it should be possible for them to move in the other direction. I would argue against the London borough of Bromley, for instance, moving in that opposite direction, but it ought to have the right to do so. That is the key thing.
If we expect local authorities to behave in a grown-up way, we must treat them as grown-ups and give them the opportunity to come a reasoned decision to fit their own circumstances. I have so far heard nothing to justify the provision, so I hope that the midlands uprising succeeds in securing a localist and devolutionary measure. I know the Minister to be a fair-minded man who will take on board the points made.

Angela Smith: I am answering this debate.

Bob Neill: The Under-Secretary is a fair-minded lady. I know both of the Minister to be extremely fair-minded. I hope that they will reflect on the arguments that have been made and accept the localist course, which is to let each local authority decide either way.

Patrick Hall: Thank you for my earlier temporary knighthood, Mr. Chope. I do not believe that it was awarded for being part of what my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak described as a rebellion, nor for being part of an uprising, as the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst suggested it was. This is not about uprisings and rebellions; it is about intelligent, thoughtful, decisive, constructive, helpful contributions to the parliamentary process. Our motivation is to improve the Bill and to strengthen local government. We want to do it from the point of view of some experience, much of it outside London, and from having seen some of the measures in practice on the ground for a number of years.
I am sure that others could add to this debate by describing their likes and dislikes. The area that I come from has had elections by thirds since the mid-’80s. I should mention that that is Bedford; I want to get the words “Bedford” and “Bedfordshire” on the record. I was a Bedfordshire county councillor when the county had all-out elections every four years, alongside a district that had elections by thirds. The two went together well. The Bedford borough elections led to an increase in activity. There were elections every year in that area, with county elections one year and three years of borough elections. That led to a lot more contact with the electorate. It also meant a lot more work, but those of us who are involved in local democracy sometimes enjoy doing that, believe it or not.

Alistair Burt: One of the consequences of the increased activity and interest in elections in Bedfordshire has been the support for an elected mayor and the process of electing a mayor. What does the hon. Gentleman think contributed to that? Was it a failure of the major, best known parties in the processes that he has described, or was it something else? What turned off the people of Bedford borough in such a way as to lead to the creation of an elected, independent mayor?

Patrick Hall: The hon. Gentleman knows the answer to his own question. I was very much involved in those matters. Before he came to Bedfordshire and became the Member of Parliament for North-East Bedfordshire, particular circumstances applied to Bedford borough; I could go into in some detail, but will not do so as it would not be appropriate. However, the argument is not about what happens in one particular place. There are reasons for having an elected mayor in Bedford. Colleagues have questioned whether having an elected mayor on a four-year term runs alongside having elections by thirds; I believe that in Bedford we have an example that shows that it does.
The hon. Gentleman was possibly alluding to strong leadership. I had concerns about the leadership of Bedford borough council, but that was due to personalities rather than the electoral system. It is important to remember that whatever system we have, whether all-out or by thirds, councillors are elected for four years. The question of whether we have a person in a stable position who is able to lead is therefore not necessarily determined by whether the system is elections by thirds or all-out.
The ground has been quite well covered by the debate so far. It does not come down to whether anyone here likes or dislikes a system of all-out or by thirds; what is important is devolution, local choice and local councillors and people deciding the best way to run local affairs in their area. The one-way street does not fit with that. There is no doubt that that is the wrong approach. It is not devolution, and I hope that Ministers will reflect upon that, although I understand that they might not be able to do so on the spot today. I therefore add my plea to the hon. Member for Hazel Grove to await Report, as I shall, and not press his amendment to a Division, in the hope that we can make some progress on the matter, which would be in the interests of local government.

Angela Smith: I thank all hon. Gentlemen for their comments on the amendment. My hon. Friend the Member for High Peak described himself as part of a Back-Bench rebellion, which the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst was anxious to join. My hon. Friend the Member for Bedford made the point that it is important that in Committee we scrutinise everything that comes before us, which the Committee has done quite admirably in this debate. Indeed, almost a third of the Committee has spoken on the amendment.
I have listened carefully to all the arguments made in the debate and it is clear from the contributions that there is a real commitment in the Committee to ensuring that there is strong leadership in local government. The hon. Member for Hazel Grove based most of his comments on the need to be truly democratic, as he put it, so that local councils alone can decide these matters. My hon. Friends the Members for Wigan, for Leicester South, for Denton and Reddish and for High Peak also raised the issue of ensuring strong leadership in local government. We are seeking to achieve both those aims in the clause.
Obviously, there are members of the Committee with considerable experience of local councils. I have eight years of experience in Essex—I must mention Essex, as it has not been mentioned yet, and we are touring the nation and I am the House of Commons’ honorary Essex girl. Because of their great experience of local government, we ought to take note of the arguments made by members of the Committee.
The Government consider that there are strong arguments that whole-council elections bring benefits to councils and communities, creating greater accountability and clarity for electors, and that such elections have the potential to strengthen the democratic process. As I made clear to the hon. Member for Hazel Grove during the evidence sessions, the Government preference is for whole-council elections. However, as has been said in the debate today, it is not that straightforward. It may help the Committee if I describe the broader context, it is quite complex.
The current position is that all county councils and London boroughs have whole-council elections. In addition, all parish councils are required to have whole-council elections. Shire district councils may request either whole-council elections or partial elections, and 63 per cent. of districts have whole-council elections. They may change their electoral cycle by asking the Secretary of State to make an order. All metropolitan districts have elections by thirds. That is clear, then.
It has been widely recognised for a considerable time that there is quite a mish-mash of electoral arrangements, which can be confusing for electors. It could be said that it is just an accident of history that we have different arrangements for different councils. That was why the Government invited the independent Electoral Commission to address those issues in January 2003. The Electoral Commission responded a year later, stating that whole-council elections would increase participation and bring clearer accountability. The Government said that they were minded to agree with the principal recommendation, which was to move to whole-council elections for English councils. In the 2005 general election manifesto, we stated that
“the case for simplifying the current local government election cycle by moving towards ‘whole council’ elections every four years”
would be examined. That is what we have done, and that is what has been discussed in the Committee today and in the previous sitting. That is the background for adopting the approach that is outlined in the White Paper and the Bill.

Patrick Hall: With regard to possible confusion about councils and council elections, certainly that confusion would arise in all two-tier areas. Living in a two-tier local government area, I find that the public do not care so much which council is responsible for which service, nor what type of election it is; it is just seen as “local government”, and that there is an election. The only way to resolve that matter is to move to unitaries, which is not the subject of the debate. I think that the confusion will always arise in two-tier areas, regardless of whether the election is by thirds or all-out.

Angela Smith: It was perhaps because of that confusion that the Government asked the Electoral Commission to examine the proposals.
 Tom Levitt rose—

Angela Smith: I will give way briefly; I want to make some progress, and some of the things I have to say may discourage hon. Members from making any more interventions.

Tom Levitt: I have never understood the point that the Electoral Commission makes about participation. I accept that, in all-out elections once every four years, turnout is higher than in any one particular year during the elections in the three consecutive years taken in the areas that elect by thirds. However, in the whole four-year cycle, the number of people who vote at least once in local elections is greater under the system of voting by thirds than it is under all-out elections.

Angela Smith: I do not think that I need to respond to that; my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak makes his claims, and the issue may be something that he will want to take up with the Electoral Commission.
In terms of what was in the White Paper and what was put forward in the Bill, first, as the Committee acknowledges, more discussion has taken place about measures that are designed to be devolutionary, giving power back to local authorities. We are devolving the decisions on this matter to local authorities. That is generally welcomed by members of the Committee. It would be for a local authority, not the Government, to decide whether to move to whole-council elections. The process for changing the electoral cycle should be a matter for local authorities alone to decide; it is a fundamental principle of the Bill that that is not a matter for the Secretary of State to decide.
The initial approach reflected the substance of the Electoral Commission’s recommendations for whole-council elections. The Electoral Commission’s 2004 report stated that
“whole-council elections every four years can provide a degree of inherent stability. Whole-council elections give a clear mandate to representatives for a programme of policies during the following four years, and allow time for an administration to carry through its policies. At the end of the four-year period the administration is held to account by the electorate and can be judged by its record, its success or failure.”
The commission’s findings led to our debate and to the Government’s proposals. The Government consider that whole-council elections can create the best framework to support and promote strong and accountable leadership if powers and responsibilities are to be devolved to local councils.
Notwithstanding the benefits, the Government recognise that in particular places, the pattern of local government elections can reflect long-held traditions valued by hon. Members. My hon. Friends the Members for Leicester, South, for Wigan, for Denton and Reddish, for High Peak and for Bedford and the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst made the point that strong leadership does not depend necessarily on the electoral cycles of a local authority. It is not automatically the case that election by thirds creates weak leadership or failing councils. Many successful councils elected by thirds have strong leadership.
The Electoral Commission recently stated that it would have preferred the Government to be more prescriptive and to legislate for all councils to move to whole-council elections with no local choice. I have made it clear that we accept the case for participation and accountability, but we have decided that local councils that elect by thirds should move to all-out elections only if they choose to do so.
We conclude that there should be a devolved process to allow councils, including metropolitan authorities, to move if they choose from partial to whole-council elections, but the amendment moved by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove would also allow county councils and London boroughs to move to partial elections, which is something not currently available to them. Our proposals will allow councils elected by thirds to move to whole-council elections, and our debate today has considered giving those councils the option to move either way.
I shall reflect on the comments made by hon. Members. The issues are quite complex. For example, if the amendment of the hon. Member for Hazel Grove were accepted and county councils that hold whole-council elections chose to move to thirds, that would have an impact on the electoral cycle of district councils in those areas. Also, because county councils are based on single-member wards, it would create some difficulty in organisation.
For those reasons, I have difficulty accepting the hon. Gentleman’s amendment. However, taking into account the debate as a whole, a strong case has been made for the Government to reflect on the issue. I do not think that there is a case for rebellion on the part of my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak. I welcome the discussion. It has brought clarity and new thinking to the issue.

Tom Levitt: My hon. Friend will be aware that the words “rebellion” and “High Peak” do not often go together. I am enjoying my five minutes of fame, but that was all I intended to have.

Angela Smith: That is a dangerous intervention for my hon. Friend to make. I would not want him to be encouraged by the response that he is getting this morning. I should like my colleagues to consider the issue and perhaps offer suggestions to the Committee and the House later that reflect the concerns raised about local democracy and equally about strong leadership, which we consider essential to local government.

Andrew Stunell: I welcome the Under-Secretary to her first outing on the Bill, and I welcome the tone in which she has presented her and the Government’s views to the Committee. I hope that the Minister for Local Government picks up the same tone in future debates. It has been extremely helpful.
May I thank colleagues on both sides of the Committee for their contributions? I do not think that there has been a hostile word so far against the amendments that I tabled, other than the Under-Secretary’s view that they should probably not apply to county councils. That is clearly a matter for further discussion. In the light of what she said, I shall not go into some of the detailed responses that I might have done, but I would like to thank the hon. Members for Wigan, for Denton and Reddish, for High Peak, for Leicester, South, and for Bedford, all of whom indicated their view that the Government should go one step further with the clause. It was never any part of the argument thatI deployed that there was anything wrong with what was in the clause, but it is what is not in it that is wrong. If the Government are prepared to look at how the matter can be made a process that will work in the opposite sense and will come back and consider that in due course, that will be a major step forward.
I was particularly struck by two of the arguments that I heard. The first was deployed at our previous sitting by the hon. Member for Wigan, who said that probably the most powerful argument that the Government will ever hear is that this is not a matter of great moment for the tabloids and that the Government do not need to fear the press reaction. Knowing how important that consideration is for the Government when they conduct their business, I hope that that powerful argument will strike home.
I hope that it also clearly came through from hon. Members on both sides of the Committee—which is blessed with having people with a wide range of experience in local government—that nobody could point to any evidence that going in one direction only would lead to a benefit in terms of leadership, policy development or participation by the public. The arguments are finely balanced and I was pleased to hear what the Under-Secretary said. In the light of that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendments.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 31 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 32

Changing scheme for ordinary elections

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Robert Syms: Having debated the issue generally, I would like to consider the specifics of the mechanism under clause 32. Many local authorities do not have a political majority: sometimes there are coalitions; sometimes there are ad hoc arrangements; and sometimes there are formal arrangements for running the authority. Decision making can change quite quickly, particularly if people fall out, as has been known in local government.
Secondly, in local government, at any one time, there are vacancies. If one looks at the list of pending vacancies for local government, sometimes there are 30 to 50 seats across the country that are not filled at any one time. Even occasionally, when there are all-up elections, there are one or two vacancies per council.
Thirdly, there are changes of representation in wards as a result of by-elections and vacancies, and there are also defections. The clause says:
“No resolution of the council may reverse the effect of this section”,
but my point is that there may be a situation in which, having passed a resolution in the permitted period, the political control of the council changes within a matter of weeks, and the council’s opinion may change. A coalition, perhaps involving independents, may change, and the view of those who are responsible for running the council may change after by-elections and defections. Many votes go through in local authorities on casting votes of chairmen or mayors. Are we saying that when a vote to change the electoral arrangements goes through on the casting vote of the mayor and when two vacancies then return two members from a different political party and that changes the view of the council, the council cannot change a resolution once it has been passed? Essentially, a decision could be taken without the express wish of every member of the council because there may be one or two vacancies, or filling those vacancies may lead to a change in the political complexion.
I do not want to labour the point, but things change in local government. I have been on hung authorities when one committee has voted in the opposite way to another and it is total chaos. I therefore seek the Under-Secretary’s reassurance. Will guidance be given? Will there be any rules or will it be purely a matter for the council and the chairman’s casting vote? If the leadership of the council changes in the period concerned, will the new leader have any means of changing the resolution? At what point does the decision become irreversible? Is it on the council’s vote, or after the Electoral Commission has nodded to it? I appreciate that if political parties have different views about the electoral benefits of a change, which I suspect they may do in different circumstances, it may be a matter of political discussion and disagreement.
Some councils have run successfully for years with a majority of one and a casting vote. On such a finely balanced council I am worried that an irreversible decision could be taken, but a few weeks later there may be a very different majority able to take a completely different decision on this very important issue. I should be interested to hear the Under-Secretary’s views on the subject.

Angela Smith: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the clarity with which he expressed his views while seeking enlightenment. I will say something about the clause and then respond to his comments.
The clause enables an eligible council—that is, a district that currently holds elections by halves or thirds—to move to whole-council elections. As I said, we will reflect on the amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. If a council wishes to make such a change, it must do so in a specified period, because the date of whole-council elections, as set out in clause 33, is different for metropolitan authorities and shire districts. It is 2008 for metropolitan districts and 2011 for shire districts. The specified period will run from 1 October to 31 December in the year before the elections are due and will ensure that, to stabilise existing arrangements, members of the public know about the change in good time but not too long before the first whole-council election.
The clause also enables the Secretary of State to extend the periods during which a resolution can be made, but we envisage doing so only in very limited circumstances, perhaps to give a council a bit of extra time and the flexibility to consider the proposals properly. The clause allows councils to hold council elections if they wish to do so.
On the point made by the hon. Member for Poole, there is a difficulty in hung, or finely balanced councils, but they still have to make decisions on their budget, which stands for a year. They have to stand by their decisions in the same way as other councils. We have to accept the decision of the electorate in choosing the council, and the decisions that that council produces. When a council has taken a vote and made a resolution, it will inform the Electoral Commission, but the commission has no role in ratifying the decision, which is taken by the local council. The council may want to consult and to have wide-ranging discussions on the best way forward, but the council’s decision, as in many other issues, is binding.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 32 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 33 to 36 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 37

metropolitan districts:councillors per ward

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Christopher Chope: With this it will be convenient to take new clause 5—Referendum to approve proposals—
‘(1) Subject to the provisions of section 37(3) the local authority may from time to time make proposals to adjust the number of councillors per ward and must hold a referendum in the ward or wards affected before taking any steps to implement them.
(2) The local authority may not pass a resolution which makes the proposed change or changes unless the result of the referendum is to approve the proposals.
(3) If the result of the referendum is not to approve the proposals, the local authority must publish in one or more newspapers circulating in its area a notice which—
(a) summarises the proposals;
(b) states that the referendum did not approve the proposals;
(c) summarises the authority’s existing arrangements; and
(d) states that the authority will be continuing to operate those arrangements.’.

Robert Syms: I should like to have a little canter around the issue of metropolitan districts and councillors per ward. When I first stood as a district councillor the ward had about 1,600 electors. The number of electors for a county councillor was about 8,000. When I fought a parliamentary seat in the midlands the ward populations 12,000 or 14,000. The average for Birmingham is about 18,000 to 20,000. Most metropolitan districts have three councillors, elected in one thirds, and they have very large wards.
Clause 37 allows additional councillors—a fourth, a fifth, a sixth, a seventh or an eighth, the number is not specified. Presumably that means larger wards. Alternatively, does it mean the same size wards but a larger council? If there are 60 members and it goes to six members per ward there will be 120 councillors. That has both cost and governance implications. If one opts to have more councillors per ward but to keep the same number on a particular metropolitan authority, it means larger wards.
One of the difficulties with our system is delivering literature in a very large ward. I am sure that we all delivered to wards because no one else will do it. We have almost killed ourselves by spending every waking hour doing so. If the impact of clause 37 is to give us larger metropolitan wards, I cannot see how it will improve general governance. There will more councillors, larger wards and a bigger division between those at the top and the bottom. I hope that the Under-Secretary can explain exactly what the Government have in mind. With three-member wards, elected on thirds, if one goes to more members in the authority there could be two members standing for election. We need rather more of an explanation. That is why we tabled new clause 5, which contains proposals for a referendum so that there would be some check and some debate on any increase in the number of councillors.
 There are also questions of gerrymandering, which, of course, was named after Governor Gerry of Massachusetts. Giving an extra representative to a particular ward may have a political significance, as can having odd or even numbers representing a ward. When southern Ireland went on to an single transferable vote system, initially after independence, some of the wards were sevens, nines or 11s, which meant that the quota for winning was quite low. As the parties got control of the system the size of seats came down to threes and fives, which benefited the larger party under the Irish system. Clearly, under a metropolitan system, if one starts to add representatives to wards under a particular formula, unless it is totally within an electoral quota, it could also have an impact. I should therefore like some reassurance from the Under-Secretary about how the extras will be added.
Under the parliamentary boundary commission system one, cannot add on the basis of projected growth. There is a base year when seats are determined and as the review moves forward there is some scope for arguments about change. However, in local government changes in growth in a ward may be taken into account. That is the one difference between the two systems. If districts can change the number of representatives per metropolitan ward simply by predicting that there will be a new housing estate in a ward and so extra representatives will be needed, it may have a political implication. That is why I want to have a little run around this clause.
I hope that the Under-Secretary can reassure me that all this is total nonsense. However, I do think that changing the numbers, we will have an impact on councils, ward sizes and, particularly if done on a predictive basis, on the political battleground.

Andrew Gwynne: Based on local knowledge, I think that the proposal is the correct one. My constituency has two local authorities, and one of them—in Tameside—was formed in 1974 when nine very independent towns came together. To this day, they remain very independent. Those towns are: the urban districts of Audenshaw, Denton, Droylsden and Longdendale, and the municipal boroughs of Ashton, Dukinfield, Hyde, Stalybridge and Mossley. When the borough was created, it was divided into 18 wards reflecting those towns. To a lesser extent today, those wards still reflect the townships of Tameside. Things got complicated in 1980, however, when an extra ward was given to the borough. Parts of the old boroughs of Dukinfield and Stalybridge were cobbled together into a new ward called Dukinfield Stalybridge ward, which confuses matters greatly because we also have the wards of Stalybridge North, Stalybridge South and Dukinfield.
Furthermore, in 2004, following the most recent boundary changes, the ward of Audenshaw, which had 10,000 electors, and the ward of St. Peter’s, which had 7,000 electors, had their boundaries altered because the average number of electors in each ward in Tameside was 8,000. To the great dismay of electors in Audenshaw—admittedly, a very small number—who are proud of their Audwinian roots, they were moved in to an Ashton ward, with which they have nothing in common. So, first, they were moved in to the ward of Ashton St. Peter’s, and then, at the next election, in to the Ashton-under-Lyne parliamentary constituency, despite the fact that their area of Audenshaw has been in the Denton and Reddish constituency since it was created in 1983, and in the same parliamentary constituency as Denton in every election since 1916, I think.
Some wards in Tameside no longer reflect the township boundaries. For example, Dukinfield is divided between the wards of Dukinfield and Dukinfield Stalybridge. Dukinfield ward is in the Denton and Reddish constituency and Dukinfield Stalybridge ward is in that of Stalybridge and Hyde. At the next election, Audenshaw will be divided in part between Denton and Reddish and Ashton-under-Lyne constituencies.

Tom Levitt: I just wanted to say that I never realised that life on the other side of the Tameside boundary was so much fun.

Andrew Gwynne: Perhaps my hon. Friend should have been at the ward boundary public inquiry. He understand just how much fun it actually was.
I think that the Bill is trying to achieve greater clarity and reflection so that wards mirror communities better. The building blocks of wards in metropolitan areas such as Tameside must have 8,000 electors, plus or minus. As I understand it, it would be possible for the Dukinfield ward to cover the whole of Dukinfield, perhaps with five instead of three members. Audenshaw ward could also reflect the whole of Audenshaw with four members instead of three. We might also have a smaller Ashton St. Peter’s ward with two members instead of three. In that case, we could better reflect the communities with which people identify, rather than create wards based on towns to which they do not belong. If the Minister can clarify that that is the intention of this part of the Bill, I give it my wholehearted support.

Angela Smith: As a southerner, I never knew that I would learn so much from the Committee about the north. I am very grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish and others. For a new Member, he has an encyclopaedic knowledge of his constituency, which he has put to good use in the Committee.
I am also grateful to the hon. Member for Poole for explaining what he intends by his new clause, which is, I think, probing. The new clause would do the opposite of what he wants it to, and the Government oppose it in the strongest terms. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman does not mean it—his party, like ours, is wedded to democracy—but the new clause would allow a council to ride roughshod over the principle of equality in elections. Under the new clause, the controlling party on a council could increase the number of councillors in a particular ward simply by holding a referendum of its supporters and members in that ward, and thereby increase that ward’s representation on the local council. I am sure that that is not what the hon. Gentleman intended, although I am grateful for his comments. He will not be surprised that the Electoral Commission opposes the new clause, which, it claims,
“risks undermining the established process of electoral reviews and the principle of equality of representation across a local authority.”
I turn now to what I think that the hon. Gentleman intended by his new clause. I am sorry that, having been so helpful on previous clauses—offering to take ideas away and reflect further—I cannot do so in respect of new clause 5. I think that the hon. Gentleman intends to provide for local authorities to increase the membership of wards by a consistent number, by multiplying the number of councillors across all an authority’s wards. If that were so, there would not be the problems that I have mentioned of electoral equality. However, decisions about wards and other such questions should be taken by an independent body, not by local authorities, even if they have the approval of the electorate. The independent Electoral Commission and the boundary committee for England are currently responsible for electoral reviews. It is through such electoral reviews that the number of councillors per electoral area—in district wards and county divisions, even though there is no reference to divisions in the new clause—and the boundaries and names of electoral areas can be changed.
I remind the Committee that clause 38 will allow local authorities to change the names of electoral areas. My hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish might wish to take that point into account if clause 38 is agreed to.
The total number of councillors on an authority may be changed under electoral reviews. The boundary committee will have to consider carefully the ability of the authority to provide convenient and effective local government under any council size. Allowing the local authority to change the number of councillors in a ward would also change the number of councillors on the authority as a whole, with no regard to the impact that such a change would have on the council’s ability to provide services to local people. The new clause would also mean that the total number of councillors for an area could be changed against the wishes of the electors across the local authority area as a whole.
The hon. Member for Poole was particularly concerned about whether the clause would mean larger wards. No ward in England currently has more than three members per ward: some have one, some have two and others have three. The Electoral Commission’s view is that having more than three members in a ward would dilute accountability and affect relations between electors and councillors. Clause 37 will allow flexibility to recommend one and two-member wards. A number of Committee members will already have a mixture of two and three-member wards in their constituencies. The clause does not necessarily mean that councils will be larger, but there could be smaller wards and fewer councillors per ward. That decision will be for the Electoral Commission to make, in consultation with the local authority.
My hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish was right to say that the clause would remove the existing inflexibility and allow the Electoral Commission to better reflect communities. I think that his point is sound. If communities feel disengaged from their wards, they are less likely to vote. We want increasing participation and we want the electors to feel part of their wards and part of the community. At same time, we want to provide equality of representation.
We believe that there is a strong role for independent bodies to play. Although we are, throughout the Bill, looking to devolve decisions to local government, in this case it is right that an electoral body makes decisions in consultation with a local authority to remove the concerns that the hon. Member for Poole mentioned about gerrymandering. The right way to do that is for local authorities to seek a review from the independent Electoral Commission. I urge the hon. Gentleman to withdraw his amendment.

Robert Syms: This has been a useful debate. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish mentioned a perfect example of why the clause was relevant to his borough. Despite the construction of many boroughs 30 or 40 years ago there are still lots of local loyalties beneath the borough level. I am glad that the Under-Secretary mentioned size decreases rather than increases, because I would be concerned about the idea of a four-member ward. If an area felt itself to have certain loyalties, it would be a better idea to split it into two two-member wards than to add a ward with three members and a bit to somewhere six miles away. If that is the idea behind the Bill, fine. That would also inevitably reduce the size of some very large wards, which would improve matters.
In light of the reassurances that the Under-Secretary has given, I beg leave to withdraw the new clause.

Christopher Chope: You do not need seek leave, because the new clause has not been formally moved. I shall assume you are giving notice that when we reach the right place in the Order Paper you will not be moving it.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 37 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 38

Change of name of electoral area

Amendment proposed: No. 129, in clause 38, page 21, line 20, leave out ‘county, the district’ and insert ‘county council, the district council’.—[Angela E. Smith.]

Christopher Chope: With this it will be convenient to discuss Government amendments No. 130 to 135.

Robert Syms: Names are quite often important in politics, not least because there is usually a degree of history behind them. Wards are sometimes named after ancient parishes despite having been overcome by large housing estates. Nevertheless, I am nervous about changing names, because sometimes they can indicate also whether a seat is marginal, and a change of name can have an impact on that. Dare I say that the name “Basildon” has on occasion been totemic in people’s perceptions?
If I took over a local authority and worked out that it contained five marginal wards, the first thing that I would do would be to change all five names, because that might convey a different view of whether some of the wards were safe or marginal. Names are quite important in political competition. People who live in a constituency with a particular name may know that at a certain time it might not be marginal but that over many years it might become so. For that reason I am nervous about giving local authorities the right to change names of wards essentially at will, and without reference to anybody else. Subsection (3) says that that cannot happen
“If the name of an electoral area is protected”,
but will the Minister say what that means? I prefer to stick to names, so that people cannot change them at will until an overall boundary review.

Angela Smith: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s contribution. I accept that names are important—that is the reason why the clause has been proposed.
I may have to disappoint the hon. Gentleman, because after the next general election the constituency of Basildon will be no more—it will become South Basildon and East Thurrock, and will be divided in two. So totemic election-night tears and joy around the country will be lost, although I am sure that another constituency will take on Basildon’s mantle.
I can give the hon. Gentleman some reassurance, however. Currently, the names of electoral areas—county divisions and wards in district councils—can be changed only on an electoral review by the Electoral Commission’s boundary committee. However, local authorities can change the names of their areas. They can change the name of the council, but not of wards, under section 74 of the Local Government Act 1972. That Act allows a district or county council to change its name by a resolution passed by two thirds of council members at a specially convened meeting of the council. That a local authority can resolve to change the name of its area but not of its wards seems to us a little daft. It can also change names of parishes, but not wards, if a parish council requests it. We believe that local authorities should be able to change the names of their wards.
Another point to consider is that there is no set timetable for when the electoral review takes place. Reviews can be between 10 and 15 years apart in some areas, which can result in the names of district wards or county divisions being out of step with real-world conditions. For example, a new development built in a ward may mean that the ward would be better identified by including the new settlement in its name.
There may be occasions when a local authority wishes to resolve issues arising from a ward name with which a community can no longer identify. In such a case the clause will allow a county council, district council or London borough council to change the name of the electoral area concerned. Any change would need to be agreed by the full council, which would need to pass a resolution at a special meeting held for the purpose. The council would then have to inform interested bodies including the Electoral Commission, the Office for National Statistics and Ordnance Survey.
It is worth considering the clause in connection with the previous clause. We are trying to ensure that local authority and ward boundaries reflect the communities there. The point made under the previous clause about two, three or one-member wards, alongside name changes, enhances the identity that the individual elector—[Interruption.] I hope that that is not for me.

Alistair Burt: It is—it says that you are doing very well.

Angela Smith: Thank you. The individual elector will therefore be able to have a relationship with their own electoral ward.
The hon. Member for Poole asked about protected areas. If the Electoral Commission has given the name within the past five years, it is protected, but if in the protected period the commission agrees to the name change proposed by the council, it can then happen. I am sure that when that appears in Hansard it will make great sense. The commission’s power to amend the names of local authority electoral areas will remain unaffected, so when a council proposes to change an electoral area within five years of a change made by the commission, the council must seek the commission’s approval. With such permission it can override the protection.

Bob Neill: I rise to seek a little clarification. I do not disagree with what the Under-Secretary is saying, and from a localist point of view I see its logic. I wonder whether there is to be any requirement to consult. How will we deal with the situation of people being genuinely unhappy about a ward name being changed? In my constituency, when the Electoral Commission changed a particular ward boundary to create something called Mottingham and Chislehurst North, there was an outcry. It was partly because people did not want to go into Mottingham but more because everybody in Chislehurst North said, “We are actually called Chislehurst West—they have got it wrong.”

Christopher Chope: Order. This is turning into a speech.

Bob Neill: I would like to know if there are any means to deal with that without causing undue bureaucracy.

Angela Smith: The hon. Gentleman has a point, and that is one reason why we propose that the decision should be taken by local councils. The Electoral Commission’s boundary committee did the same in my constituency, misnaming it Basildon instead of Basildon and East Thurrock. By having decisions taken by local councillors we can remove that problem. The normal consultation process will apply, but having decisions taken by local authorities is the way forward.
In summary, the clause will give local authorities the power to make their own decisions about local names. That is part of the process through which we want to engage people with their electoral areas, to increase participation in local government elections and local government.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendments made: No. 130, in clause 38, page 21, line 22, leave out ‘district, the county’ and insert ‘district council, the county council’.
No. 131, in clause 38, page 21, line 38, after ‘borough’, insert ‘council’.—[Angela E. Smith.]

Clause 38, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 39

Executive arrangements for England

Alistair Burt: I beg to move amendment No. 56, in clause 39, page 22, line 18, leave out ‘two’ and insert ‘four’.

Christopher Chope: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 57, in clause 39, page 22, line

Alistair Burt: We now come to an interesting part of the Bill. The Minister has indicated that he will respond, so we hope that he has been refreshed by his break and we look forward to hearing what he has to say. If we are to believe contributions that the Committee has already heard from witnesses and Back Benchers, as well as from Back Benchers on Second Reading, there is plenty of scope for amendment and reconsideration by the Government of this part of the Bill.
A couple of amendments to the clause have been tabled. I will not steal the thunder of hon. Gentlemen representing the Liberal Democrats, who have more fundamental objections than we do to the concept of an elected executive, but I will be interested to join the debate on the next set of clauses. There is plenty of generic interest in the measures.
Perhaps the most difficult thing that the Minister will have to deal with is the sense that this is a top-down reform. For all the Government’s talk about devolving power and giving people more responsibility locally, the clause is another example that shows that the Bill is intended confine local government to a particular set of models at the Government’s insistence. From what we have already heard in relation to previous clauses from colleagues on both sides of the Committee, there is a feeling of concern that goes to the heart of what we talked about during the witness session, which is the sense outside of a degree of separation between the elected and those who elected them, and a concern that there is control from the top down. That sits uncomfortably in a mass participative democracy, in which people every day have more and more opportunity to express their views. The approach that the Minister is taking to the Bill on the back of the White Paper is not quite doing what he would like it to do. I think that we will have a number of discussions on a similar theme.
The limitations of participative democracy have been illustrated over the past few days, as we have seen the interest taken by the general public in the opportunity to petition No. 10. They have taken that opportunity in great numbers, only to have their desire for involvement slapped down by the very people who created the opportunity. There are people out there who are involved and interested, who want to say to the Government, “There are more ways of doing things than you are letting us believe, and your attempt to nanny us and corral us strikes us as an attitude of concern.”
The amendments are relatively small and I will not go into the larger issues affecting the concept of elected executives until we debate the next set of clauses. The amendments propose increasing from three to five the number of councillors who can be involved in the executive, so that the leader of a council would operate with four or more councillors, instead of the two or more councillors suggested in the Bill.
The spirit of the amendment is clear. It is recognition of the sense that things are more likely go wrong in a local authority when matters have been held by a small group of people and not disseminated to the rest of the council than when more people are involved. We maintain that a group of three people, invested with executive authority in a system that does not involve a directly elected mayor, is too small.
That should appeal to the Government’s general sense of control. In theory a group of one is by far the best number to make decisions—preferably the Secretary of State in a Labour Government. How easy decisions are in those circumstances. Great debates can be held. The issues can be examined fairly and objectively and weighed up and of course, the right decision will inevitably be reached. In the real world, however, more people have to be involved in decision making. I am reminded of the story about John F. Kennedy’s dinner for Nobel laureates at the White House. He stood up to address the dinner and said:
“I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White house, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
In theory, one can create a special model where a very small number of people may hold control, but unless those people are exceptional it is usually wiser to expand the group. Just two or more councillors, as under the Bill, are not sufficient. We have tabled our amendment, which would make it four or more councillors, to diffuse that executive control. There is a greater risk of cabals when there are only three councillors. When things go wrong in local councils, it is usually caused by a small number of people acting in a clique, often in one-party areas where over time corruption has got in. The smaller the number of people making the decision, the easier it is for such problems to arise.

Andrew Stunell: I have been following the hon. Gentleman’s argument carefully. I think I understand it well. Does it lead him to the conclusion that a mayoral system is potentially more open to corruption than other systems?

Alistair Burt: There has to be a check on the power of the elected mayor. Certain safeguards are built in about how much power a mayor has when dealing with a local council elected at the same time and to which he must refer. It is the concentration of executive authority that is worrying. There is a balance to be struck. There are some cases where the public have spoken and directly elect a mayor. The mayor is subject to ultimate accountability by the people and in some cases we want to try that model, provided that the public have an opportunity to express their support and to change that system.
Another of our concerns about the Bill is that it is too much of a one-way street and does not give people enough power to move back from a system that they find uncomfortable. There is always the issue of the concentration of individual power, but directly electing a mayor and the way in which a directly elected mayor must work with the rest of his team make that less likely.

Peter Soulsby: Does not the hon. Gentleman accept that it is the strength of the checks and the scrutiny that are most important, rather than the numbers of those who are being checked and scrutinised?

Alistair Burt: No, it is a balance between the two. There is a real danger in having a group of only three invested with the powers. Widening the number to five seems a better balance between scrutiny and numbers than the Bill’s provisions.
There was much discussion on Second Reading and among witnesses of the sense that councillors were out of the loop. We will discuss that more when we get around to considering whether there should be an option to allow authorities to go back to a committee system or an enhanced committee system if they want. We will support the amendments moved at that time to ensure that local authorities are given that option. Much of the evidence from witnesses and many of the comments made by Members expressed concern that in local government people came on to councils, but then found that they were out of the loop and not involved, so they did not stay long. They did not feel that the council was something in which they could participate. The smaller the number of people invested with authority, the more likely that is to be the case.
The amendment is a simple, straightforward mechanism to widen the number of people involved; it is safer to have five rather than three. I hope that the Minister will consider the amendment appropriate to the spirit of the Bill, as it would increase the number of people involved in executive authority and involve more people in participatory local democracy.

Phil Woolas: Thank you, Mr. Chope. I also thank the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire for the manner in which he has spoken to his amendment, which strikes at the heart of what three of the amendments in the group seek to do. It gives me a good opportunity to explain the Government’s thinking on the executive arrangements.
Members have referred to the Bill as devolutionary. It is indeed a devolutionary Bill, and it is a decentralising Bill. However, I place caveats on that, on behalf not only of the Government, but of Parliament. One could take a completely devolutionary attitude and say that it is up to a council to make its own government arrangements and to do whatever it wants, but Parliament would want some limits to that.
The hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire made a point about political disconnection, which also featured on Second Reading. As well as devolving power, we believe that it is equally important that local authorities are given power over significant sums of public money that cover not only local authority spending, but strategic direction over other public spending in the area through the duty to co-operate that the Bill provides, and through the local area agreement process on which it builds. Strong leadership is not merely a phrase or propaganda slogan. Strong leadership, or what can best enhance strong leadership, goes alongside the devolutionary powers.

Alistair Burt: While we are on the philosophy and strategy behind the Bill, I fully understand the reason why local authorities are the creation of Parliament and primary legislation, but is not the problem that because the public have become concerned about the centralisation of power—a process in which the Conservatives have played their part over the past 20 years—

Robert Syms: A small part.

Alistair Burt: How good it is to have a colleague who gets to the nub of the issue at just the right moment.
The issue now presents a different problem for Government. It is not only about the curtailing of central power to make sure that local government works, but about bending over a little further and taking a bit more risk to allow the public the sense that centralism is genuinely being withdrawn. When they see the Government’s desire to enforce leadership structures, the public do not feel that that necessary risk is being taken. That point is at the heart of the clauses that deal with executive arrangements.
[Mr. Joe Bentonin the Chair]

Phil Woolas: I welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Benton.
The hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire makes an important point about philosophy. I was trying to describe the process. It is necessary and right for Parliament and Government to set a framework. Obviously, we are discussing the best model and the best series of options for local councils. If we reflect on a previous debate about all-out elections and elections by thirds, we can see that strong leadership can be provided by either system. That was the most persuasive argument as far as the Government are concerned, which is why the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon, responded as she did. 
To add force to my argument: so important does my party think that council leadership is that it is mentioned on page 107 of our manifesto. I can claim, too, a spectrum of political support for strong leadership, although not necessarily using the boundaries in the models that we have proposed. I often refer in public to the examples of Manchester and Kent where, whatever one’s views on party politics in those areas, there has undoubtedly been strong leadership, not just of the council as an institution, but of the place being represented—that is the crucial point. The leader of Manchester council is the leader of that city, not just of the council. I would argue the same for Kent—I use that area because it is a bipartisan example, but I could probably think of some for the Liberal Democrat party, too. In fact, I am desperately trying to do so.

Andrew Stunell: I am sure that Liverpool was on the tip of the Minister’s tongue. I draw his attention to the fact that, of his examples of strong leadership, one council was elected by thirds and the other by an all-out election, so I hope he will take back his comments.

Phil Woolas: That was exactly my point and why I responded as I did when I pointed the Committee to the answer given by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary. The criteria would be met, not of devolution, but of an executive and electoral governance model that can provide strong leadership to satisfy the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire, and achieve his goal of better connection, which I think is shared by the whole Committee.
I do not suppose that you will allow me, Mr. Benton, to go into the history of the centralising forces of local government, so I shall not do so.

Alistair Burt: Just cover the last 10 years.

Phil Woolas: It was the 1945 Government who nationalised the utilities and did most to take financial powers from local government. But hey ho! Herefordshire—I think—is joining its primary care trust and local authority budgets. That is a significant move back from the other great centralising measure against local government—the national health service.
I shall set out the proposed legal changes because authorities and their executive officers will look at this debate, and before responding to the amendment, I shall comment on clause 39 more generally. It provides for changes to the executive arrangements that local authorities in England can adopt—the provisions refer to England only—and does so by amending section 11 of the Local Government Act 2000, which provides that the executive of a local authority shall take one of three forms: a mayor and cabinet executive, a leader and cabinet executive or a mayor and council manager executive.
For the record, in Wales, all things being equal, those three forms of executive arrangement will remain unchanged, subject to any future decisions by the Welsh Assembly and parliamentary approval of this Bill. Clause 39 will provide for those three models in England: a mayor and cabinet executive, a leader and cabinet executive or an elected executive, which we will come on to when we debate the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove.
The arrangements for a mayor and cabinet executive will be the same as they are at present. A person will be elected mayor of an authority and will then appoint two or more councillors of the authority to make up the executive. That is the case at the moment. Changes to the arrangements for a leader and cabinet executive made by clause 39 will strengthen the role of the leader of the council. As happens now, the council will elect a councillor to be the leader of that authority, but whereas the existing legislation allows the executive to be appointed by the leader or the council, in future, that decision will be in the hands of the leader only.
The Bill puts the executive power of the authority in its constitution into the office of the leader. In practice, whether a council is run by majority control or is subject to arrangements if there is no overall control, the process will not change much, if at all, in how the leader is chosen and how his or her power is exercised. The clause provides for the executive power to be in the hands of the person who is accountable to the public through the overview and scrutiny arrangements, an important point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, South. Those arrangements are the other side of the coin and are not covered in these clauses.
The other significant change is that in future English authorities will no longer be able to adopt the mayor and council manager model of executive. I correct my background briefing paper, which says that there is little support for such a model: there is no support for that model. The intention was to provide for strong executive power to be put in the hands of a mayor and his or her council manager when circumstances required it. In England, there is only one such example: the fine city of Stoke-on-Trent. That is why I made the recent ministerial statement to Parliament and why I am engaged in discussions with Stoke-on-Trent about the interim arrangements should we pass the Bill.
As I said, there is little or no enthusiasm for the model, which has the effect of concentrating power in the hands of an unelected official. Instead, we will make available the option of an elected executive whereby the whole executive is directly elected by the electorate of a council area. We may return to that point later.
The changes develop further the executive arrangements introduced in the 2000 Act, which have done much to speed up and improve the transparency and accountability of the decision-making process. The proposed changes draw on the lessons of research into governance and delivery in local councils, which shows strongly that the single biggest factor driving local government performance is effective and dynamic leadership. The need for such leadership can only grow; the ambitious agenda in which local authorities develop a clear local vision for the future of their area and have the ability to work with the partners we described in the Bill to shape their local economies and social and environmental circumstances can happen only if there is strong, stable and visible leadership.

Alistair Burt: The Minister is touching on issues that are covered in the White Paper under the heading “Stronger leadership” in paragraphs 3.15 onwards, which discuss the research he mentioned and the stronger leadership and effectiveness of leadership models. However, paragraph 3.17 states that
“many local authorities have adopted a cautious approach to change.”
Has the Minister or his Department done any research on why, in councils dragging their feet and allowing their feet to do the talking, councils have expressed a preference for not doing things his way? We come back to the sense of giving councils the choice to do things rather than forcing models on them. Why does the Minister think that the councils have been so reluctant?

Phil Woolas: Like the hon. Gentleman, I suspect, I have never believed that radicalism and structural change are the same thing. Some of the best councils have a traditional model of leadership. The Audit Commission’s comprehensive performance assessment scores for the current round will be made available later this week. There is no necessary cause and effect between an executive model and strong leadership; it can depend on the individuals involved and the body politic. New York is often quoted as an example of strong leadership with a mayoral model. Under Giuliani, arguably, it was, but it also went bankrupt under the same electoral model—or nearly bankrupt, but I will not go there. I am not saying necessarily that there is a cause and effect, but I am trying to create the circumstances in which that would be most likely.
Secondly, I believe that the Government are not, as the hon. Gentleman implied, imposing a model. We are trying to give a range of options within a framework within which strong leadership is most likely to come about.

Alison Seabeck: On the options that are going to be made available, most members of this Committee will have been lobbied by a number of groups, including the Local Government Information Unit, which expressed concerns that the Government have ruled out an option whereby the councillors themselves can choose to elect the executive. Would my hon. Friend be good enough to explain why that option was not favoured?

Phil Woolas: In practice, a council will be able to do that. The changes that we are making put the statutory executive power of the council into the hands of the office of the leader of the council. The process by which the council leader and the executive are appointed will, I imagine, be in practice as it is at the moment, through the decision of the majority group and the delegation of power to that leader and his or her executive.
What, therefore, is the purpose of suggesting this change? It is to ensure accountability. It is accountability for the policies and the delivery of the council and, crucially, accountability for the policy and delivery of the council’s services and activities through its partner organisations. They involve huge sums of money and require such accountability. With devolution—and this is an important point at the heart of the Bill—comes responsibility. To ensure that responsibility, it is quite right that accountability to the electorate and the back-bench councillors is there, more so than is currently the arrangement where there is a greater balance of accountability through the Audit Commission process and through Whitehall powers.

Bob Neill: The Minister will also be alert to the comments of the Local Government Information Unit that leadership does not necessarily mean the leader. My particular concern is this: he will have seen the submission from the Commission for Racial Equality, particularly paragraph 11, which expresses concern that the proposed mayoral or elected executive model would make even worse the current under-representation of ethnic minorities at council leadership or cabinet member level. Is not a cabinet of at least five, with opportunities for a leader to balance portfolios to reflect diverse communities, better than one of three?

Phil Woolas: One of the interesting political and policy developments as a result of the Bill is the failure of central and national bodies to realise that when we say we are devolving, we mean it. If Mr. Trevor Phillips writes to me about that point, I will redirect him to send his letter to the leader of a council. It is the council that will have to take such decisions and be accountable for them. I can see circumstances in which the hon. Gentleman is right and where there is a fall away in diversity among executives. If that happens, who is it that should hold that decision to account? Is it me, or more likely, my successor, or the electorate and the elected councillors of that area? I know what is more likely to be effective; I believe that it would be the people and the elected executive.

John Pugh: Assuming a scenario in which a leader is appointed, and he then appoints, with the tacit agreement of the council, an executive, is it possible during his term of office for him to change entirely that cabinet or executive, perhaps even picking people from a different political party and for the council to be powerless to do anything about that?

Phil Woolas: It is possible, as is the case at the moment. There are councils in which executive power is shared even when a majority group is in control. On Second Reading, we had a debate about East Riding. The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr. Stuart) intervened, and I pointed out that East Riding was—at the time he was referring to—a very successful Tory-Labour coalition. That coalition now involves the Liberal Democrats and the independents as well. To answer the hon. Member for Southport, that circumstance arises because of the accountability that the council feels to the local electorate, particularly when geographical areas within the local authority have different political traditions. Many members of the Committee will be familiar with that. Therefore, such accountability is more likely to come forward in those circumstances.

Alistair Burt: We do not wish to hear talk about the hon. Gentleman’s successor. May the king live for ever. He deserves it.
I want to bring the hon. Gentleman back to his earlier comment about the models of leadership and his not believing that he was offering a prescriptive model. I bring him back to my central contention—I do not think that others see it as he and the Government see it. The LGA brief states:
“The aim of the executive arrangements is clearly to enable strong leadership. While we support that objective, we believe that there is no single model or set of models suitable everywhere. Councils should have the discretion to put in place arrangements to suit their circumstances, including exploring new types of arrangements not currently on the face of the Bill.”
The LGA does not feel that it is having a free and open choice even though the Minister believes he is not being prescriptive about strong leadership. I ask him to reconsider the point that the nature of the Bill is less devolutionary than he thinks it is.

Phil Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He referred to the LGA brief. I think what I said previously—and certainly what I intended to say—was that the Bill was not unduly prescriptive. It is quite right that there are limits to the devolution. One could envisage circumstances in which some authorities may go for a kibbutz-type of executive arrangements or perhaps even rolling referendums by text message every day. Some of the proposals that I have seen—

Andrew Stunell: Petitions on websites?

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman chides me by saying petitions. His party would try to govern the country—God forbid if it was ever given the opportunity—by decision through petition. That would mean contradictory decisions every hour of the day. I was not going to mention which party was responsible for some of the local authority governance models that would result in the clogging up of decisions. One can imagine what I am talking about.
I am teasing the hon. Gentleman, but there is a serious point. If one was serious about devolving power over executive decisions and public finances without putting conditions on what executive arrangements there should be, the majority of authorities would opt for an indirectly elected leader and executive. In practice, the process of choosing that leader and executive will be the same as it is at the moment. However, there is an important change on accountability, which strikes at the heart of what the hon. Gentleman is trying to achieve when he talks about reconnecting or connecting executives with the public. That is why I refer to being unduly prescriptive. 
Regarding the new types of executive models, we again have to strike a balance between allowing authorities to make innovative suggestions and not allowing the irresponsible devolution of powers. As we will consider later, the directly elected executive model, one of the three options in the Bill, has come from local authorities. It did not come directly from the debates within the Department, but from within the local authority family.
 Andrew Stunell rose—

Phil Woolas: I will give way once more but, Mr. Benton, I think that you will insist that I address the amendment, which is what I am meant to be speaking about.

Andrew Stunell: I am interested in the point that the Minister has just made about the model coming from local government. Does he recall the look of bafflement on the face of the LGA deputation when they were asked where the model had come from and what the arguments in favour of it were?

Phil Woolas: I have seen a look of bafflement on the faces of members of the LGA on many occasions—worthy body that it is.
I can but repeat the fact that the idea of directly elected executives came from local councils throughout the political spectrum. On the one hand, I am accused of heavy handed centralism, while on the other I am criticised for taking an open, devolutionary approach. However, I guess that that comes with the territory.
The amendment would restrict councils’ range of options for the size of their executive when they choose to operate either a leader and cabinet executive or an elected executive. In the case of a leader and cabinet executive in England, the range of options is the same as the 2000 Act already provides for the existing leader and cabinet model. It is also along the same lines as the elected executive model. I listened carefully to the arguments made by the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire for increasing the minimum size of an executive to five from the current three. In essence, all the arguments are judgments about what we think may be appropriate in particular circumstances.
In some circumstances, five might be appropriate. In other circumstances, it may be eight or four. One of the things that I have learned in this job is just how important geography is to a local authority and to how decisions are taken. Let us consider the example of Cornwall, which is a significant geographical area, and compare it with the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish in Tameside. The geography—let alone the history and culture—changes how decisions are made and rightly so, which means that models of accountability must have flexibility. There is a fine line.

Alistair Burt: The Minister’s argument suggests that executives should be larger rather than smaller to deal with such matters.

Phil Woolas: My argument concludes that greater flexibility is required. We are teasing out some paradoxes. Here I am again being devolutionary—let them choose.
The hon. Gentleman made a serious point about corruption. He referred to circumstances in which corruption would be more likely if there were only a small number of people. I acknowledge the common sense of that view, but I refer him to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, South that accountability and scrutiny by the council and councillors individually and, of course, the probity of the officers protect us all against corruption in local government. The numbers that we propose under the Bill are the same as the existing circumstances. I am sure all Members join me in welcoming the probity of our local government, which in 99.9 per cent. of cases has proved to be very trustworthy. I am sure that the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire would join me in acknowledging that point.
The judgment is balanced, but greater flexibility is important. I want to put on record some of the principles behind the clause. Those that underpin the executive arrangements under the Local Government Act 2000 and the Bill are important. The Act provided for the first time a separation of the executive of the council and what is called the back bench of the council. I do not think it is appropriate to use a parliamentary term in respect of a council, but I am sure that members of the Committee will acknowledge the difference.
The 2000 Act provided that most council decisions were to be taken by a small number of high-profile, visible councillors whom the public recognised as responsible for those decisions, rather than through the previous committee structure, which I do not believe was transparent, visible or accountable to the public. That was done to make it clear to the public who within the council was responsible for those decisions. It was also done to speed up decision making and to enable councils to give more effective leadership for their areas.
Again, that is important in the context of the Bill. It is not just a question of speeding up decisions for the sake of it, or at the expense of consultation or accountability. It is important for the coming together of local authorities and their partners that decisions can be taken effectively and speedily. The biggest single complaint against local authorities from the private, voluntary and community sectors is the lack of effective decision making.

Peter Soulsby: Does my hon. Friend accept that his point about the division between the executive and scrutiny is actually an argument for restricting the maximum size of the executive rather than the minimum size? Problems with the status and effectiveness of scrutiny are often a reflection of the perception—at the least—that all the most effective members of a local authority manage to become members of the executive and that scrutiny is undertaken by those who are left out.

Phil Woolas: My hon. Friend raises an important point. My argument is against the amendment, the consequence of which could be interpreted as he said. Greater flexibility is what is important. It is sensible to have a maximum—I think that the figure is 10. Again, there is a balance.
The idea behind the 2000 Act was to make executive decision making more visible, more transparent and therefore more accountable, as well as to speed it up. The Act also did something equally important that the Bill builds upon, which was to provide for overview and scrutiny to hold the executive to account and to facilitate policy development in the local authority. The overview and scrutiny process does not merely scrutinise. It can take up reports, investigate and make recommendations to the council like our own parliamentary Select Committees. Despite the pain they can sometimes cause a Government, it is acknowledged by Governments and the House that they are a valuable part of our democratic process.
In building overview and scrutiny—one councillor described it at the Birmingham conference as overscrew and mutiny, which I took as a compliment to the concept—we are building on the 2000 Act in the Bill. We see it as an evolution, admitting that the council manager problem has not worked out as intended. We seek to develop further the governance framework for councils, both as regards the executive and—as we shall see when we come to overview and scrutiny later in the Bill—so that we can facilitate councils’ delivery of the strong, effective and accountable leadership needed to shape the areas they represent and not just the institutions of which they are the executive controllers, as well as their delivery of higher quality and responsive public services. One key point about leadership of local authorities is the ability to work with other partners from the business, voluntary and public sectors to make a joint effort to implement strategies. That is why executive models are so important in the new local government era.
I think I have answered the points that the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire made. He talked about the nature of participative democracy as opposed to representative democracy, and one must strike a balance, whether through the Bill’s measures to facilitate people’s involvement or not. It is obviously important to us all that actions or explanations for inaction are given in response to public involvement.
The point behind the Government’s thinking is that although opportunities for involvement and for influencing decisions are crucial, we cannot allow participative democracy to replace representative democracy. That would lead to a lack of decision making. It is a tribute to the hon. Gentleman’s imagination that the idea of increasing two to four on an executive was turned into a fundamental political philosophical debate, despite the fact that he directly contradicted the contribution from the hon. Member for Poole. However, I guess that they have to probe.
I hope that I have provided the Committee with an explanation of the Government’s thinking, and I ask that the amendment be withdrawn.

Alistair Burt: I, too, welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Benton.
The debate has been an interesting, and I am grateful for the way in which the Minister has dealt with it, but his imagination is running riot if he thought a contradiction was emerging between my hon. Friend the Member for Poole and me.
The Champagne moment this morning came from the Minister spreading open his arms and saying, “I am going to be devolutionary. Let them choose”. I shall remind him of those words when we discuss other models of council leadership. However, for now, I appreciate the debate, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 38, in clause 39, page 22, line 28, leave out subsection (6).

Christopher Chope: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 39, in clause 40, page 23, leave out line 19.
No. 40, in clause 40, page 23, leave out line 36.
No. 41, in clause 41, page 26, leave out line 13.
No. 43, in clause 41, page 28, leave out lines 10 to 15.
No. 45, in clause 41, page 29, leave out line 33.

Andrew Stunell: I shall start by dealing with the question of strong leadership. Everybody in the room is in favour of strong leadership; the alternative would be to be in favour of weak leadership. Similarly, we are all in favour of good government, because the alternative is to be in favour of bad government. The Minister introduced the idea that we should be in favour of good devolution, rather than bad devolution, or as he put it, irresponsible devolution. I sign up to strong and good against bad and weak. Let us be quite clear about that.
The amendments would remove the proposal for an elected executive. I welcome what the Minister had to say about the continuation of the existing executive model. It, of course, contradicted the Bill, but it was good to hear that there will be no change. There will be a four-year term and increased accountability, but councils will be free to wangle the new rules that the Government impose on them, so that they can carry on as they do at present. Accountable turns into fixed as normal.
At the heart of the Government’s proposals there is confusion based on the complete misconception that strong leadership must mean strongly centralised leadership. The elected executive proposal provides a clear example of that confusion. The Minister referred to the examples of Kent and of Manchester. I might have mentioned Somerset and Liverpool. All sorts of examples show that neither the leadership model, nor the electoral system, or anything tangible in the Bill, leads to a significant difference in the performance of councils. Neither the number of stars councils get, nor what Ofsted thinks about them—or any of the factors that the Government routinely take into account to judge councils’ performance—are affected, either for the better or the worse, by the leadership models under which they function. That is not to say that there is no diversity in the performance of two councils with the same leadership model. Despite all the praying in aid of strong leadership for the model under discussion, it falls to bits if it is considered seriously.
The debate on clause 41 will probably go more to the heart of our criticism of the Bill than will the discussion on this group of amendments, which are designed to remove one of the models that the Minister is proposing. When we get to that clause, I shall argue that, in the spirit of devolution—with open arms, as the Minister so clearly demonstrated with his body language—we should be aiming for internal self-government for local authorities. We should have as many different models as possible with the minimum of prescription. Incidentally, I would not have supported the Conservative amendment, because it would have restricted councils’ freedom and ability to decide what to do.
I am surprised and disappointed that the Government are withdrawing the town manager model. It is okay to say that there is no support for it, but what is wrong with leaving it on the books so that a local authority can consider it as a possibility? The Minister may ask why, if I am saying that, do I want to get rid of the elected executive model? I should explain that I want to do so because it is operationally fundamentally flawed and unworkable. The Minister has had difficulty picking a solitary local authority that wanted the system. One was provided for him in the evidence session; it turned out to be Stockton. The response of the LGA representatives was, “Well, we do not have a whipping system in the LGA, so Stockton can think what it likes”—with “However daft it is” in square brackets. That must have been a powerful piece of evidence for the former Secretary of State, who has a constituency in the neighbourhood. However, it was not a powerful piece of evidence for the current Secretary of State, whose constituency is in the metropolitan borough of Bolton, which has no overall majority of members at the moment and has had changing leadership over the past three years.
We need to consider carefully the proposed model and what is wrong with it. It is unworkable in the most basic way. Some of the problems will be illustrated when we get to clause 41. A recent Conservative amendment would have restricted the size of the executive. Under the directly elected executive model, the size of the executive would have been predetermined before the process got to the ballot box. That means that it is not open to a Conservative party to say that it believes in a limited, small number or, perhaps—having just heard its views in the debate—a large number. Perhaps it would want a 14 or 15 executive member system—following what the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire said—as the way the authority should be led in future. It would not be open to a Labour party, perhaps with a more centralist view or a mini-mayor model, to say that it wanted a slate with two members on. What is wrong in practical, working terms, is the predetermination of the slate size, which cannot be a matter of electoral competition between the parties.
Other problems include the fact that, if the leader of a council goes under the executive model, all the members of the executive are immediately dismissed. I wonder whether the Government have considered what would happen if the leader was hit by a bus a fortnight before the council was to take a budget decision and all the executive members were taken out. There will be no opportunity to change elected members who are not up to the job—no crop rotation. If we have a Home Office situation—I do not wish to wallow in the Government’s grief on that—it will be impossible to move an executive member who is failing in the job or has become discontented with their lot. Of course there are all sorts of problems because, as has been mentioned, it is not automatic that the party with the largest number of votes in an area gets the largest number of seats. That is interesting in my borough of Stockport, where it has happened on a number of occasions.
That brings us to the matter of running elections for the council at the same time as those for the elected executive. Using rational thought, it seems to me that the leading councillors from each political group will be in the slates for the executive. One of those slates will be elected—let us say for argument that it is the Labour slate—at which point the executive members’ council seats will become vacant and there will be a set of by-elections to replace them. In an authority such as Tameside, where there is a regular, substantial majority of Labour voters in most wards, perhaps that would not be a problem. However, one can perfectly well see that in a large number of other places—I could speculate on where they might be—the subsequent by-elections would result in non-Labour members being elected and the majority of the Labour administration being lost.
All those issues are straightforward and practical, and the current model completely fails to address them. There is also the small matter of the change in political composition that takes place anyway as time goes on. Some 30 per cent. of local authorities currently have no overall control and 40 per cent. have experienced such a period in the past eight years. When we reach clause 41, I shall argue that it is void for want of certainty. It is impossible to tell how it will work or is intended to work and what its outcome will be, other than that all the predictions suggest it will be error-prone and prone to catastrophic failure because of the Government’s inability to say precisely what they believe should happen in each case. None of the situations in question is dealt with in the Bill.
In the spirit of our earlier debate, I ask the Minister to reconsider the matter, reintroduce it in the Lords if that is what he wishes to do and make some connection between people who know how local government works and the person holding a quill pen who wrote the words in the Bill. The clause is fundamentally and completely unworkable. That brings me back to my first point: if the Government wish to introduce more and more different models that councils can opt into, that is fine by me. I do not have a problem with it, nor does my party. However, just as they have now decided that they made a serious mistake with the town manager model for Stoke, which they have withdrawn, they have the opportunity to recognise the serious mistake they are making on this occasion before they make it. They can have another go at introducing a model that makes practical sense for local authority management and leadership.
I could wax lyrical and longer, but I have made my point as clearly and explicitly as I can. The model is unworkable and would be completely catastrophic for any local authority. Unless the Government can satisfy us on a number of issues, it is clear that they or their successors will come back to us and say, “It’s like Stoke mark 2. We screwed up and we want to take it away.”

Bob Neill: I am interested in the observations of the hon. Member for Hazel Grove and I have a lot of sympathy with him, gained from my own experience in local government and from talking to other people. I would prefer that the Government did not prescribe the governance system for councils at all. I would prefer that it was left for them to decide in a broadly devolutionary fashion, but if the Government are going to do it, they should get it right.
It is noteworthy that a range of the written submissions made to the Committee highlight exactly the same sort of practical concerns as those the hon. Gentleman has just described. The Local Government Association raised that concern and the submission from Unlock Democracy went into considerable detail about the practical implications. I do not want to repeat what the hon. Gentleman has said, but there seems to be a real concern here. The elected executive is a peculiar combination of a strong mayor model on the one hand and the traditional executive leader and cabinet that we are becoming used to on the other.
I see the logic of the strong mayor model. It is not always appropriate but one sees the logic of adopting the American pattern of one directly elected figurehead, with some separation between the elected mayor and the council that scrutinises him. In a Committee considering a different Bill, I criticised the way we have not followed that logic through in London. Under those circumstances, there is an argument for the mayor’s executive being separate from the council. That is what happens in New York where there is a system of deputy mayors who are not members of the city council. They form a legislature cum scrutiny body.
An interesting idea for a directly elected mayor of London in the future would be to have a slate and deputy mayors rather than some of the other bodies, but that is not what we have now. The directly elected executive takes the worst of that system—it removes the executive from the membership of the council—but does not have the benefit of the strong, single political figurehead with the strong electoral mandate that one has in the New York or London style systems. It falls between two stools. That is very dangerous.
I am just about old enough to have been elected to a London borough at a time when it still had something that was referred to colloquially as the aldermanic by-elections. There was a period when councillors elected a certain number of aldermen and there were frequently by-elections to fill their places.
 Patrick Hall rose—

Bob Neill: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman remembers that.

Patrick Hall: I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way. Does he think that the directly elected executive, whether or not there is support for it around the country, does not have a leader? I think it does.

Bob Neill: It certainly has a leader, but it is undesirable to decouple the members of the executive from membership of the council in the way that is proposed here and create by-elections. Although the leader has some status, it is not the same in terms of public perception and electoral legitimacy as that of a mayor. In the New York scenario it would be “Vote for Bloomberg for mayor” together with a list of his nominees for deputy mayor. It is not the same in practice. That is the real problem here.
In the days when there were by-elections to fill vacancies created when councillors were appointed to be aldermen, the turnout was usually minuscule. About a month after the main election for councillors one would try to persuade people to go out and vote again. Frequently turnout was down to about 10 per cent., which did nothing for democracy. The point is well made by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. We have seen it in by-elections to this House when Ministers have been sent to the House of Lords, such as Lord Whitelaw of Penrith and others.

Phil Woolas: You lost that seat.

Bob Neill: Exactly. The electorate sometimes react against what they perceive to be a needless by-election. Funnily enough, the Government are creating a needless hostage to electoral fortune in requiring councils to go through that process. It is no good the leader of the council explaining that he did not want to have these by-elections to fill the places of members who are now members of his executive but that the Government require him to do so. That will not cut much ice with voters who wonder why on earth they will have to go through the rigmarole again a matter of weeks after they had had just done so. I think it would damage the credibility of the electoral system.
Secondly, I do not think it is desirable for the elected members in this system not to be people with constituents and constituencies. That is the difference: with the mayoral system, everybody seems to understand the separation of powers. The proposed system seems to hover between the two; it does not quite go the whole hog of the separation of powers on the American model, which might be intellectually justifiable, but produces some of the downsides without some of the benefits.
The point is also made about how important it is, if we are going to have somebody who is called the leader of the capital, that that person can demonstrate to the electors and the residents of the borough or district that they command the confidence of the majority of the councillors. It is very difficult for them to work otherwise. If people want a directly elected mayor again, that is fair enough, as they do not require that because they have their independent mandate. However, to dilute that situation with the leader and the executive is undesirable. Things do happen—councils change control. A practical example comes from my part of the world. Control of the London borough of Bromley changed as a result of two by-elections between the council elections, not this time but the time before. From 1998 to 2001, there was a change of control. What would happen if we had had a leader and an executive ostensibly there for a four-year term, but the majority of the council had gone the other way? That clearly would not be sustainable. There has got to be proper provision to prevent that happening.
There is also a concern about the inability to shuffle the pack. When I was a councillor in the London borough of Havering, the leader of the council appointed the committee chairmen, and they effectively formed a Cabinet. There came points when we thought that is was appropriate within our four-year term to move members around, so somebody might have been chairman of the housing committee for a couple of years—it might have been four years, and passed through an election—and wanted to bring people on. Somebody might have said they were not going to stand again at the next election, and he might want to bring somebody forward to get into that portfolio in time to fight the next election. There is nothing to suggest how that would be possible under the present system. Those are exactly the practical, nitty-gritty bits of day-to-day local government practice which whoever drafted the current proposal does not seem to have taken on board. That is why I have real misgivings about the way the clause is currently drafted. I really think that the Government should think about it again.

John Pugh: I think we are engaged in creating undue disharmony from over-prescription. I would like to illustrate that with reference to my local authority, of which you and I, Mr. Benton, were members and, I think, leaders. I hope that we were strong leaders; I am sure that we were.
The current system in Sefton is that elections occur by thirds. The executive is established and it reflects the balance of the parties and the balance of the whole area. From square one, as long as there has been an executive, Sefton has had that system. We are very sensible, mature people who are capable of talking to one another, and habitually on the Cabinet, there has been a Tory leader, a Labour leader and a Lib Dem leader, with the Lib Dems currently leading the council—for obvious reasons, connected with electoral success. It does not lead to inefficiency: the Audit Commission and comprehensive performance assessment bear that out. It does not lead to hard decisions being dodged, and it does not lead to a lack of ability to work together. In fact, this year, the budget, which is normally agreed by two parties, was agreed by all three parties. What would be a nightmare in that situation would be an executive slate on a party basis. That would be profoundly distorting because of the political geography of Sefton. I am not sure that it is as politically diverse as Denton and Reddish, but it is certainly pretty diverse. Labour wins seats only in Bootle, and nobody else does, despite sincere trying from time to time, as you are all too clearly aware, Mr. Benton.
Central Sefton is a bit of a mix, and Labour never wins anything and never has in Southport. Whatever executive there were, including a directly elected executive on a party slate, it would necessarily be seen as a colonial power in some part of the borough. We could be saved by sticking with the status quo, although that is not quite the situation, and choose the option of leader and cabinet. Obviously, any leader in that sort of scenario would be very wise to appoint an all-party cabinet. However, as I understand it, there is nothing in arrangements currently before us that would prevent a clear-out by the leader, a quick change in the cabinet—rather like the Prime Minister from time to time changes his Cabinet—that destroys that balance, so reducing the authority to a state of comparative paralysis. Such things happen—if a leader went mad under the current four-year term arrangements, there would be little option other than to shoot him. There is an entirely workable and happy arrangement in Sefton, which operates consensually and satisfactorily whereas, under the Bill, we would be pinioned between two really quite unattractive alternatives.

Alistair Burt: When I first examined the clause, my approach was a permissive one—similar to that of the hon. Member for Hazel Grove, who said that he had had trouble with ruling things out of the Bill, because if people want a directly elected executive, we should let them have one. However, given the further remarks that have been made by both him and others, I feel that the Minister needs to do more if he is to satisfy the Committee that the proposal is a good one.
The Minister mentioned that the idea came from local authorities themselves, but we could do with a bit of evidence for that. Stockton was mentioned in the witness discussion, but I cannot see in the White Paper a long list of councils that have clamoured for the proposal, and it would help if the Minister said where the push actually came from. The illustrations of practical flaws that have been given by those who have commented have been quite significant, and one wonders which council has missed them.
Let me pick out one of those flaws. It comes from one of the Minister’s party colleagues, so I think that he ought to answer it. Jeremy Beecham told the witness sitting of the Committee that he was unhappy with the proposal. He said:
 “There is...a question as to why it is necessary for the executive not to be drawn...from elected councillors? Why do you have to treat them, as it were, as a class apart within the council?”——[Official Report, Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Public Bill Committee, 30 January 2007; c. 19.]
He made that point in answer to an issue that was raised by the hon. Member for Bedford about the involvement of councillors, and to illustrate that one could have all sorts of initiatives to involve councillors with a strong leadership model, and yet, despite that, the directly elected executive leadership model would produce a further barrier to involvement. Given that a colleague of the Minister offered that concern, the Minister might wish to think about it.
My second point is one that has cropped up on a number of occasions and was made by Unlock Democracy—the “one-way street” argument. The White Paper and the Bill presume that if the model adopted is that of a directly elected mayor or a directly elected executive, then that will be fixed and there will not be an opportunity to reconsider. That seems contrary to the spirit of devolution in which the Minister has set out.
The Minister has a tough set of questions to answer on the practical difficulties that have been raised by so many people connected with local government.

Phil Woolas: I think particular praise should be given to you in your Chairman’s role, Mr. Benton, because obviously you had to remain neutral when the hon. Member for Southport made comments on your local council. The frozen look on your face was one that I wanted to put on record for the benefit of the readers of the Liverpool Echo. My mind boggles at where we could go on that.
Throughout the debate, including in the weeks and months preceding today, I have been surprised by the level of opposition from the hon. Member for Hazel Grove to the proposal. He has campaigned and spoken with some force, and I find that genuinely surprising. The idea for a directly elected executive, or a slate, came initially from Stockton council and has been considered by other authorities including, I believe, Cornwall and Durham county council. As I said during the previous debate, it is often the geography of a place that dictates the arrangements for best governance. I make my argument on this basis; the hon. Member for Hazel Grove has been almost passionate in his opposition to the model, and yet he claims that his approach is a permissive devolutionary one—if the model does not work, let Stockton worry about it. The hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire said we had got it wrong over the city manager model—no, Stoke council has said it does not want it and I will not tell Stoke that it has to have it. That is perfectly permissive, but it passes the test of strong executive arrangements.
The hon. Member for Southport said that everything was hunky-dory in Sefton. Everything is not hunky-dory in Sefton. Your constituents, Mr. Benton, require good services, improvement in economic performance and regeneration. North Liverpool’s regeneration is the largest single infrastructure project in the United Kingdom, and it came about not because of strong leadership from Sefton council—I pay tribute to the hard work that the council does—but because of the intervention of the private sector and Government agencies. That is why it is happening.
We cannot accept that the status quo in all parts of the country is enough; we have a responsibility to ensure that the best models are in place. Regarding the directly elected model, I do not accept the argument that, on the one hand, we should be devolutionary and permissive and, on the other, because hon. Members do not like this particular model, it should not be allowed. That seems to be contradictory. If there are difficulties with that model, let us talk them through with the relevant local authorities.
I get the impression from Opposition Members that they do not accept the case that strong leadership matters.

Bob Neill: With respect to the Minister, does he accept that the thrust of the argument some of us are making is not that there is anything wrong with being devolutionary, but that it is the Government who have chosen to set up a particular menu from which councils must choose and therefore that it is incumbent on the Government to ensure that the menu includes options that are practically workable? That is my real concern.

Phil Woolas: The hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire asked me to provide evidence of where the idea had come from, and I have done so.

Alistair Burt: You gave me three pieces of evidence.

Phil Woolas: That makes it wrong?

Alistair Burt: No.

Phil Woolas: Okay, so it does not make it wrong.
I will run out of time and I do not want to delay the Committee. Regarding the points that the hon. Gentleman has made about the comments by Sir Jeremy Beecham, I would give the same answer to Sir Jeremy Beecham as I have given to him. I do not think it is incumbent on me to respond to those points just because Sir Jeremy is in my party; it is incumbent on me to respond to the hon. Gentleman’s points because he is the Opposition spokesman.
Where the Government disagree with Sir Jeremy is that the model has come forward from local councils and it provides for a directly elected slate, which would offer visible and accountable leadership. There may be pragmatic problems in implementing it, but there are pragmatic problems in implementing any model of government. I am sure that, when our forefathers introduced the idea of ward councillors, they envisaged practical problems. However, in my view those problems can be overcome. The model is not a one-way street; it does provide for a reversal of the decision. The principle that underlies the arrangements in the Bill is that the method by which a leadership model is chosen is the method that can undo it, whether that be referendum or decision.
The hon. Member for Southport described the situation in Sefton. He could be absolutely right, but I would imagine that Sefton will not opt for this model, because of the reasons that the hon. Gentleman has given. The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst displayed a centralising tendency, in effect saying, “Well, I will devolve as long as I like the model that is being given”. I do not accept that.

Bob Neill: As long as it works.

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman should trust the local electorate and the local authorities.

It being One o’clock, The Chairmanadjourned the Committee without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned till this day at half-past Four o’clock.